On the Town

Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas

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Throughout December we're reviving our Monday morning Song of the Week franchise and dusting off some SteynOnline audio specials celebrating the composers and lyricists of the Christmas songbook. We started the series with my podcast on Carl Sigman, the author of "A Marshmallow World", my holiday single with Jessica Martin.

For the second of our Christmas audio specials, here's an encore of my two-part tribute to the composer of our Song of the Week #107 and one of the most popular of all seasonal standards, "Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas". Hugh Martin, who died last year at the grand old age of 96, was a guest on The Mark Steyn Christmas Show on a couple of occasions. In this special podcast, I draw on those archive interviews to celebrate a talented composer, lyricist, vocal arranger, pianist, singer and actor. In this two-part program, we'll hear "Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas" sung by everyone from Frank Sinatra to Twisted Sister, and from the Steyn archives we'll hear Hugh Martin's own live performance of his seasonal standard on my Christmas show a few years back - followed by Jessica's and my very different take on the song (which can also be found on our full-length album, Making Spirits Bright).

In the first part of our podcast, Hugh talks about working on the Judy Garland film Meet Me In St Louis, and learning the tricks of the trade from Kay Thompson, author of Eloise; and we dust off some of his classic vocal arrangements. You can listen to Part One by clicking above.

To hear Part Two, simply click here.

from On the Town, 10 Dec 2012

PAUL SIMON, LONE TEEN RANGER

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In lieu of our usual Song of the Week, we present a SteynOnline audio special: Mark talks to singer-songwriter Paul Simon - including a tour of Simon's boyhood neighborhood and a live performance of his very first song

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A Theme to a Kill

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(Audio) Mark celebrates the career of 007's music man John Barry in a SteynOnline audio special with special guests David Arnold, Don Black and Tim Rice - and two hours of classic Bond songs...

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